Brittain, Vera
[January 13th]
I arrived at a very opportune though very awful moment. All R's things had just been sent back from the front through Cortès; they had just opened them and they were all lying on the floor. I had no idea before of the aftermath of an officer's death, or what the returned kit, about which so many letters have been written in the papers, really meant. It was terrible. Mrs. Leighton and Clare were both crying as bitterly as on the day we heard of His death, and Mr. Leighton with his usual instinct was taking all the things everybody else wanted & putting them where nobody could ever find them. (His doings always seem to me to supply the slight element of humour which makes tragedy so much more tragic.) There were his clothes -- the clothes in which he came home from the front last time -- another set rather less worn, and underclothing & accessories of various descriptions. Everything was damp & worn & simply caked with mud. And I was glad that neither you nor Victor nor anyone else who may some day go to the front was there to see. If you had been you would have been overwhelmed by the horror of war without its glory. For though he had only worn